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Eleanor and Park are both outcasts - Eleanor for her wild red hair, weird clothes, and painfully difficult home life, Park for being a half-Korean comic book nerd in white, working class Omaha. When they meet on the school bus in 1986 and gradually bond over their shared love of X-Men and music, Eleanor and Park know their relationship will face obstacles. They're "smart enough to know that first love almost never lasts, but brave and desperate enough to try."

This is a smart, touching love story told in short alternating chapters. While it's full of '80s musical references, you don't have to be old enough to remember Walkmans and mix tapes to enjoy this story. Eleanor and Park are complex and relatable characters, whose adolescent struggles are universal. If you're a sucker for John Hughes movies or you love John Green's books, you'll like Eleanor and Park!

In the past few days I've had several people ask me for more books like Divergent by Veronica Roth. If you haven't read Divergent yet, it takes place in a future in which all members of society are divided into five factions. When it comes time to choose her future, Beatrice learns that she is Divergent, not fitting into any of the five groups. She also learns that someone in the government is hunting down Divergents and killing them. It's full of action and adventure and it's great!

Here are a few more futuristic titles you may want to try:

Legend by Marie Lu: In a dark future, when North America has split into two warring nations, Day, a famous criminal, and prodigy June, the brilliant soldier hired to capture him, discover that they have a common enemy.

Dualed by Elsie Chapman: In this future, everyone has an identical twin that they never meet, also known as an Alt. At some point between the ages of 10 and 20 the two twins are forced to seek each other out and try to kill each other. Only one twin can survive.

Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi: Aria lives inside a dome, safe from the poisonous atmosphere outside. But one bad decision leaves her exiled to the outer wastelands known as the Death Shop. If the cannibals don't get her, the violent energy storms will. She meets a wild and dangerous Outsider named Perry who is her only chance of survival.

If you think writer's workshops are only for amateurs, think again. Since 2008, YA authors Maggie Stiefvater, Brenna Yovanoff, and Tessa Gratton have posted more than 250 works of short fiction on their collaborative website, Merry Sisters of Fate. Like their respective novels, the flash fiction and short stories on Merry Fates deal with the paranormal, the weird, and the strangely beautiful.

Thirty stories from the Merry Fates project are now available in The Curiosities: A Collection of Stories. The stories are great on their own, but what makes the book really special are the introductions and handwritten notes and critiques from the trio. They provide insight into the creative process - how three acclaimed writers construct story arcs, build worlds, and create believable characters. This is an inspiring read for anyone interested in writing fiction!

Try NON-Fiction – it can be a real trip! Here are some of my recent favs from the realm of the real…

Pretty much anything by Jon Ronson is a lot of fun to read and if you can listen to him read it himself – even better! He is a British journalist, and he tackles some weird topics with rare wit.

The Psychopath Test – Go deep into the madness industry and see just how crazy it is. Ronson explores how we define madness, how we treat the mentally ill and how most of top CEOs are probably psychopaths.

The Men Who Stare at Goats – you might have seen the movie, but the book is pretty funny! Yes. The United States military tried to create a secret unit of highly trained psychics who could kill with their minds… or something like that. It’s true! Weird, but true!

Mary Roach writes books about stuff you want to know about but didn’t know you wanted to know about. Like what you would need to take on a trip to Mars, and how how much of our society we owe to dead bodies / cadavers.

Spook – This book talks about the science of the afterlife; chronicles the research regarding the human soul, reincarnation and whether electromagnetic fields can make the human brain see ghosts? How much does the human soul weigh? Let’s see…

Stiff - From being crash test dummies to being something someone would like to snack on, this book looks at all the ways that society uses human corpses. Sometimes disturbing, sometimes funny, this gives you something to think about.

Michael Pollan is the guru of the organics movement, thanks to his entertaining and informative books on botany. Yes. I said, “Botany.” These books will make you think twice about your food and just how cunning apples really are.

The Botany of Desire - This book is about apples (surprisingly devious!), tulips (which single-handedly destroyed the Dutch economy!) and marijuana (which has mutated into a monster of its former self!). Funny and bizarre, this book makes you reconsider your house plant (and what it might be thinking about you!).

The Omnivore’s Dilemma – If you love eating McDonald’s French fries… don’t read this book. This book goes on a journey through the American food universe and what Pollan finds is not always fun to know, but it’s important… and might just keep you from mutating into some sort of deranged man-bear-pig type creature. Just sayin’…

The world is a big, awesome, crazy place full of amazing weirdness! If you keep your eyes open for it, you can spot it all around. Some of my favorite weirdness comes in the guise of… SCIENCE!

Here are a couple of my favorite ‘science’ books that put a new spin on things. They might make you reconsider how you view the universe.The Dancing Wu Li Masters : An Overview of the New Physics by Gary Zukav: This book introduced me to particle physics but not in a boring, academic way. The voice is conversational, the science is real, and the possibilities that exist in and around us are mind blowing! You will never look at the world the same way again.

The Hidden Messages in Water by Masaru Emoto: Water holds memory and, according to the studies of Dr. Masaru Emoto, intention as well. Dr. Emoto exposed water to words and then froze the water into snowflakes which he would film. He noticed that positive words like ‘love,’ and ‘truth,’ would cause the water to transform into beautiful, perfect snowflakes. Negative words like, ‘hate’ or ‘pollution’ caused the water to transform into distorted, ugly snowflakes. This happened whether you spoke to the water or just put a sign close by the water with the word written on it. Crazy! But sooooo neat!

I'm late to this party, but I still want to blab to everyone I know about this book! Ready Player Oneby Ernest Cline came out in 2011 and is set in the not too distant future. A future that is so bleak with fuel, job and food shortages, that most people on earth would rather plug into a virtual reality known as the OASIS (Ontologically Anthropocentric Sensory Immersive Simulation) than deal with reality. In the OASIS you can do anything you want, be anything you want, explore any and every universe ever created -- Star Wars, Arrakis, Star Trek, Tolkien... it's all there.

Our hero, Wade Watts was a young teen when the creator of the OASIS died and set in motion a crazy scavenger hunt for an 'Easter egg' hidden somewhere in the virtual world that is worth a fortune. Five years later no one has even come close to solving the puzzle until Wade finds the first of the three keys needed to find the Easter egg...

This book is filled with trivia about pop culture from the 1980's, gamer references galore, fast action and really likeable characters. I was really bummed when it ended, but I am hopeful that the rumors of an upcoming movie adaption are true. Then I will be able to lose myself in the game all over again!

Have you read The Selection yet? I think it reads like a cross between a reality TV dating show and the royal wedding. When the prince needs to find a wife, 35 young women are selected to live with him in the palace. They are sent home as he weeds them out until only one woman remains--the one who will become Queen. All this is broadcast on TV and the families of the women are rewarded depending on how far the girls make it in the competition.

The Selection was optioned for a TV show right when it came out, and now the CW has approved a script for the pilot. I'm excited to see how this turns out because it was such a fun book! Here's a trailer for the book, which may give you some ideas for what the show could look like:

While we wait for the show, get yourself on the hold list for the sequel, The Elite, which comes out April 23.

Will Henry is the assistant to Dr. Warthrop, a monstrumologist who studies those dark creatures who haunt our nightmares. When a strange corpse is delivered to their doorstep Will Henry and Dr. Warthrop discover and attempt to destroy a pod of Anthropophagi living in their home town. Warning! This book is not for the easily scared (like me).

At last! The long wait is over! The second book, following Cinder, in The Lunar Chronicles is here and it does not disappoint! Meyer has a really accessible writing style and this novel is fast paced with engaging characters. There's also a nice re-imagining of the Little Red Riding Hood tale just for good measure.

In this installment Cinder's trying to break out of prison--even though if she succeeds, she'll be the Commonwealth's most wanted fugitive. Halfway around the world, Scarlet Benoit's grandmother is missing. It turns out there are many things Scarlet doesn't know about her grandmother or the grave danger she has lived in her whole life. When Scarlet encounters Wolf, a street fighter who may have information as to her grandmother's whereabouts, she is loath to trust the stranger, but is inexplicably drawn to him, and he to her. As Scarlet and Wolf unravel one mystery, they encounter another when they meet Cinder. Now, all of them must stay one step ahead of the vicious Lunar Queen Levana, who will do anything for the handsome Prince Kai to become her husband, her king, her prisoner.

Scarlet has a long hold list but it is well worth the wait. It is also one of our Lucky Day titles so check the library when you are here and see if you get lucky!